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Thread: How Hannibal could win the Second Punic War.

  1. #1

    Default How Hannibal could win the Second Punic War.

    I'm interested to hear your views on how Hannibal could have won in Italy.

    At what points in the actual history did he come close to winning?

    Did he only have the one shot at winning by marching on Rome after Cannae?

    Was the failing that insufficient of Rome's Italian allies defected to him?

    What could have been done differently in Italy to improve Hannibal's chances of success?

    In short how do you beat Rome?

    JAN.

  2. #2

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    Wasn't much of this discuss in the thread; "Hannibal vs Alexander"?

    The question is interesting but seeing that no one has replied makes me think that somewhere in this forum this has been discussed before...

    But to answer you, maybe he needed more reinforcements..
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  3. #3
    Decanus
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    Yes he did need reinforcements. But other than that he needed the politicians support back home. It is the men of the Cartheginian government who ended up screwing Hannibal over, they had a lack of support for him. If this support was embarraced more, he could have had a succesful campaign in Italy.

  4. #4

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    I prefer not to be an armchair strategist, but I've always wondered what would have happened if he'd marched his Iberian army on Carthage itself, and requested aid from Rome as part of the coup. He could take control of the center of power, ambush and massacre the Romans before or after, and use his firm base in Spain and Africa to attack Sicily and Italy by whatever multifarious routes he could devise.

  5. #5
    Obi Wan Asterix's Avatar IN MEDIO STAT VIRTUS
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    Vandal Carthage this is a tantalizing what if....
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  6. #6

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    If this topic has been covered before perhaps you could direct me to where it has been as I'm new to the forum and I haven't ploughed through the 20 odd pages of the Hannibal v Alexander topic.

    Reinforcements would certainly have helped as would the unqualified backing of the Carthaginian government but neither of these would have broken Rome in themselves.

    My own view is that Hannibal should have marched on Rome immediately after Cannae as I feel this was the most likely point in the war when Hannibal could have achieved a decision.

    Maharbal, his cavalry commander, is reputed to have been in favour of this move. It has been put forward that Hannibal would not have been able to take Rome by direct assult as the city was not completely defenseless and his army was not in a position to afford a long siege. This is probably true but the shock and despair in Rome immediately after the catastrophe of Cannae followed up by Hannibal appearing at the gates may just have pushed the Romans into capitulating. By all the yardsticks of the age they had lost the war and every other nation would have called it a day.

    I feel it was worth a try and even if it had failed, Hannibal would have been in no worse a position if he had marched on Rome than if he had not.

    JAN.

  7. #7

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    Not to mention marching on Rome might've won Hannibal the support from the other cities he was looking for. To see a foreign arming marching on the capital city of an enemy would give them more incentive to join in. Not to mention the Carthagian government might've given him the support then. The morale boost from doing that probably would've have a positive impact for Hannibal's campaign, in more than one way.


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  8. #8

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    My own view is that Hannibal should have marched on Rome immediately after Cannae as I feel this was the most likely point in the war when Hannibal could have achieved a decision.

    Maharbal, his cavalry commander, is reputed to have been in favour of this move. It has been put forward that Hannibal would not have been able to take Rome by direct assult as the city was not completely defenseless and his army was not in a position to afford a long siege. This is probably true but the shock and despair in Rome immediately after the catastrophe of Cannae followed up by Hannibal appearing at the gates may just have pushed the Romans into capitulating. By all the yardsticks of the age they had lost the war and every other nation would have called it a day.
    Many folks have criticized Hannibal for not doing exactly as you say, though there are a good many problems. There were just too many armies on foot that could assault him while he was laying siege to Rome, a city that could without aid, field a force equal to Hannibal's.

    Vandal Carthage this is a tantalizing what if....
    I've only ever heard brief speculation on the possibility, mostly from Dodge and another Irish historian whose name escapes me at the moment... but, alas, he seems to have been at heart a true patriot.

  9. #9
    Obi Wan Asterix's Avatar IN MEDIO STAT VIRTUS
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    Hannibal should have taken Rome. At Numantia and other sieges, the Romans made a ring of fortifications around the besieged city that was in the end more redoutable than the besieged city itself! I think Hannibal should have taken Rome... We would all be speaking dialects of Phoenician today....
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  10. #10

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    I'd be Dwightabal and you'd be Asteralqart

    Hannibal could have tried to build lines of circumviliation around the city, but he would have undoubtedly been assaulted before their completion, from within and without. Whether Hannibal could beat the direct citizen levies of Rome is questionable enough. With support from twoer artillary, it would have been tough.

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    Obi Wan Asterix's Avatar IN MEDIO STAT VIRTUS
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    It would have been... but he could have been inventive and actually strangled Roman trade without besieging... or something of the sort.... he should have devastated Latium at the very least... it is necessary to attempt the core objective in such cases, even if risking everything... he could have also taken back Sicily, this would have given Carthage and edge ... in short he beat the Romans militarily but failed to do enough damage to their economy, trade, and strategic positions.. crossing to Sicily from Calabria would have been easy enough.... its doable on rafts even. He could have also invited Phillip for an invasion... this according to Polybius was a possibility
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  12. #12
    MoROmeTe's Avatar For my name is Legion
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    Taking Rome was not really an option. He lacked siege equipment and also he was rather low on manpower and Rome could field more armies.

    He needed reinforcements, either from Carthage itself or from Spain. And he needed another good commander to split his army into two (when reinforcements arrived) so that he could threaten Rome and at the same time threaten allied cities in Italy so that he could gain support.

    And he also needed a little luck...


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  13. #13

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    Hannibal was waiting for his brother to arrive, so his brother could 'watch his back' so to speak while he strangled Rome itself. If his brother was victorious in Northern Italy then things may have been different. THAT was the decisive moment of the 2nd Punic War.

    Until that moment he could not march on Rome, not without reinforcements from Carthage. The Romans probably wouldn't have curled over and died at the sight of his army, they were Roman after all, and the sacking of Rome probably would not have been the end of them. That is what seperated Rome from the rest of the world.

    In reality - it was almost impossible for Hannibal to win, because he had lost before he had begun. His strategy that enabled him to sneak into Italy and gain surprize also guarenteed he would never be able to take Rome itself.
    Hannibal couldn't sack and ravage Italy, because he desperately needed the support of the local Roman allies to win.

    I think Hannibal may have won if his brother had not lost, which in the end was a very close thing and probably the closest moment to Hannibal winning the 2nd punic war.

  14. #14

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    In reality - it was almost impossible for Hannibal to win, because he had lost before he had begun. His strategy that enabled him to sneak into Italy and gain surprize also guarenteed he would never be able to take Rome itself.
    Hannibal couldn't sack and ravage Italy, because he desperately needed the support of the local Roman allies to win.
    Hannibal was forced to alienate his allies on several occassions, to permit the survival of his army. His position after a while was really just untenable outside of Bruttium. The Socii fragmented much more slowly then he'd imagined, and the Romans managing to invade Macedon undoubtedly left him feeling disappointed with the auxiliary details of his plan. Hannibal, it seems, at his greatest time of need... is consistently faced with poor lieutenants. One of the commanders of the Roman army in Sicily was a Numidian deserter, disenfranchised by Hannibal's lieutenant (not his brother) Hasdrubal. Both his brothers failed to make any headway, or to even hold their own in Spain. Syphax betrayed Carthage, then Massinissa betrayed Carthage, Philip is beaten in his own lands, and in Italy all of his underlings seem incapable of surviving without him.

  15. #15

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    If it got to point of Hannibal starting a formal siege of Rome the the odds of him winning with his current army would not be good for all the reasons already given. The period of Hannibal's best chance of winning was a matter of days rather than weeks after Cannae while Rome was on the ropes and a siege may not have been necessary.

    If Marharbal's cavalry was despatched immediately, followed as quickly as possible by the main army, the cavalry was likely to have reached Rome before Varro's remnants trickled in. This would have considerably added to the shock of the defeat and stood a good chance of causing a complete panic when the full details from Varro's survivors became known. Hannibal's main army then arriving would have reinforced the apparent hopelessness of Rome's situation.

    As Bagelmeister suggests, it would likely have made many more of Rome's Italian allies change sides, solving Hannibal's manpower situation and maybe allowing a formal siege to become an option if Rome still didn't give in.

    JAN.

  16. #16

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    ...Besieging an undemoralized Rome is indeed NOT the point. Using the demoralizing effect of his great victory at Cannae, Hannibal should indeed have attempted to either rush the gates of Rome or to capture it by means of treachery. There was certainly a chance, a chance he didn't take.
    ...Hannibal was probably the best of all tactical commanders in ancient history, but unless there is information unknown to us in our time, his strategic thinking leaves something to be desired. I myself find it amusing that his future nemesis(Scipio Africanus) was in his power at both the Ticinus and Cannae, and both times escaped. What would the campaign in Iberia have been like w/o the presence of this great commander, not to mention the 'Waterloo' of Zama?

  17. #17
    MaximiIian's Avatar Comes Limitis
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    Why should we be discussing 'how hannibal could've won', when:
    1. he didn't, so .
    2. The world would've sucked majorly with Carthage in control. No western country = no western culture.

  18. #18

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    Are you saying that Carthage didn't have a culture?

  19. #19

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    Hannibal could have marched against Rome right after Cannae. He did march on Rome at a later date, in an attempt to take it by surprise while the main Roman army was besieging Capua. Most likely Maharbal was right criticising him.

    As for the main topic of this thread, Hannibal probably could have won by not starting the war the way he did. He took highly unnecessary risks. The Roman reaction was swift and right on target: one consul was sent towards Spain (Publius Cornelius Scipio) and the other to Carthage via Sicilly (Tiberius Sempronius Longus). Hannibal was too lucky in the beginning and the first Roman generals too incompetent and this is why the second Punic war dragged for so long. Once the Romans had good generals in command, it was game over for Carthage.

    Hannibal's thrust from Spain towards Rome is similar to the German attempt to take Stalingrad and Caucasus in the summer of 1942: attack an ennemy who has superior resources by launching an opperation far away from your base and without adequate forces to protect your supply lines. Almost pure gamble!

    A better way to defeat Rome would have been to regain naval superiority. Corvus could have been immitated or the Carthaginian ships could have employed better trained marines. Preventing the Romans from landing on a ship was like defending a bridge: the advantage is to the defender. Naval superiority would have allowed the recapture of Sicily or landing on the Italian coast at leisure.
    Last edited by Dromikaites; July 29, 2005 at 01:32 PM. Reason: Typos
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  20. #20
    MaximiIian's Avatar Comes Limitis
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    Quote Originally Posted by VandalCarthage
    Are you saying that Carthage didn't have a culture?
    Not a western one. That was Rome and Greece's doings.
    Yeah, Carthage had a culture all it's own, but it wasn't Western Culture.

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